Unforgettable
by omizumaru
Summary: In answer to StormSingerRaven's challenge, I give you Unforgettable. Sesshomaru and Rin stumble across the recently deceased Kagome and he is persuaded by his ward to revive her. Kagome can recall nothing of her life nor her death so she remains with him.
1. Chapter 1

It was unquestionably a beautiful evening, and although the taiyoukai would never let his thoughts or emotions be shown, he was enjoying it immensely. The air was crisp with the first hint of fall, and there was a gentle wind blowing in from the west. Sesshomaru stopped walking and tilted his head into the wind, scenting the breeze as though he would be able to pick up traces of his home on it. Unfortunately, he could smell nothing but the faint hint of a bear demon. Determining that the scent was weak and that there would be no danger in their current place, he decided to stop for the evening.

"Jaken" he said in a soft monotone voice, addressing the creature behind him.

"Y...Yes m'lord?" his retainer questioned.

"We will make camp here." He was going to have to do something about the toad's stuttering problem.

"Of course Sesshomaru-sama! This is a perfect place to rest for the evening! Trust you in your greatness to select such a relaxing, lovely, peaceful..."

"Jaken" Sesshomaru bit out while rolling his eyes.

"Yes m'lord?" Jaken knew by his lord's tone of voice that nothing good was going to be said next. He only hoped he could avoid a slow and painful death.

"Cease your incessant groveling and be useful."

"Of course m'lord! Thank you for sparing your humble retainer's worthless and pathetic life! It is certainly much more than I could ever deserve..."

"Jaken!" This time there was a distinct lack of patience in Sesshomaru's smooth baritone voice.

With a quick and high pitched squeal, Jaken beat a hasty retreat to gather some wood for a fire.

Hearing soft giggles, Sesshomaru turned to face his little human ward for the first time that evening. She was on Ah-Un's back, both hands covering her mouth in an obvious, and failing, attempt to disguise her mirth at the toad's scolding. Sesshomaru quirked an eyebrow at the little human child and she began to laugh louder. Studying her for a moment, he noticed that the girl was, once again, dirty. She had done nothing other than ride on Ah-Un's back all day, and yet she needed to bathe. He couldn't understand how the child was so messy. It did not seem to matter whether she was walking, riding the two-headed dragon, running through the woods gathering flowers or torturing Jaken, she invariably ended up dirty. It was one of life's few great mysteries for the taiyoukai.

"Rin."

The girl immediately ceased her giggling at the sound of her name. "Yes Lord Sesshomaru?"

"You need to bathe."

She giggled again. "Okay Lord Sesshomaru! Rin will go bathe!" Sesshomaru noted how lightly she dismounted Ah-Un and was secretly pleased at her agility. He watched as she ran past him on her short little legs, and headed straight towards a nearby hot spring.

She always seemed to know, as if by instinct alone, in which direction a spring lay. He had never had to give her directions to one, and yet she unerringly found one no matter where their location. Walking in long strides behind the girl, Sesshomaru gave his head a light shake. A woman's instinctual ability to find a place to bathe; another of life's great mysteries.

He caught the scent of freshly spilled blood and recent death before the scent of Rin's fear. He called out her name, but not soon enough to stop the girl from seeing the scene of carnage by the spring.

Rin stopped running so quickly that she almost toppled over and had to windmill her arms to keep from hitting the ground face first. She let out a little scream at the sight of so much blood, but before the sound had any real time to gather volume, she felt a large hand cover her mouth while another grasped her shoulder and forcefully turned her face away from the scene. She looked up only to meet her lord's shinning golden eyes.

Sesshomaru did not wish for his ward to see such a massacre, fearing that it would remind her of her parent's, and possibly of her own, death. She had never had nightmares or expressed fear about battles or death, so he wasn't certain as to why he had expected her to cry or show signs of shock at what she had just seen. Lowering himself to one knee, he gazed thoughtfully into soft brown eyes that expressed no fear or sadness, but only curiosity. Once again he was strangely proud of the little girl.

"If I release you, do you promise not to scream Rin?" he asked her. The scene that lay before him was more than enough to send all of his senses into over-drive, and the ear-splitting shriek of the little girl was an unnecessary addition. When she nodded her head, he released his hold on her. "You will stay here" he told her curtly.

He stood and walked over to the spring, briefly noting the way his boots made a squishing sound in the blood soaked grass. It had been a very long time since he had witnessed such a scene of devastation. A large bear youkai was at the edge of the little clearing that surrounded the spring. Quite assuredly dead, the creature lay on it's side, it's hide pierced through by numerous arrows. But the bear was not what held the taiyoukai's attention. Instead, his eyes narrowed and focused on the form of a woman sprawled on the ground beside the waters of the spring.

She was nude, and had fallen on her stomach, leaving her back to be caressed by the cool night air. Long ebony hair was strewn about her head, and the fading sunlight made the strands reflect the reddish glow of the setting sun, creating a blazing corona around the woman. Her exposed back was marred by five deep slashes, obviously from the bear's claws, so profound that they exposed the underlying musculature. Blood still seeped from the wounds and trickled down her side to coat the already sodden earth.

So the demon had attacked her and she had, despite her massive trauma, responded in kind, wounding the creature enough to cause it's demise before it could escape. "To be so gravely injured and to still fight back and kill your attacker. This woman was a warrior and died an honorable death" Sesshomaru thought to himself. He was struck by the entire scene before him and the woman's obvious courage. He could see that she was merely human, and he was curious as to her identity. He would learn her identity and give her the burial that a warrior such as she deserved. He attempted to catch her scent, but he could smell nothing over the reek of blood and death.

Walking up to her side, he bent down and reached out one clawed hand to grasp her shoulder. Pulling gently, he turned her face towards his own.

He heard a short gasp from close behind him and knew that Rin had oddly disobeyed him. She was usually an obedient child, and he wished that she had remained true to her nature on this occasion; he did not wish for her to see this.

"Lord Sesshomaru!" Rin cried out as she grasped his leg tightly. "It's Lady Kagome!"

Ah yes. I'm starting another one. I couldn't help myself. I saw this on the challenge board and thought that it was such a good idea that I couldn't bring myself to pass it up. Plus, I feel like I need a little Cannon in my life right now since The Telling is giving me some major problems. I don't know when I'll continue on that one, so I thank you all for your patience. I'm not abandoning it by any means, but until I can figure out where I am going with the plot, it will be on a little vacay.

Anyhoo, time to give credit where credit is due:

This is from the Single Spark challenge board, and was posted by StormSingerRaven. Thank you for the excellent idea and I hope you're pleased with the outcome. Hope you're okay with lemons, as you didn't really say and I just can't resist!

Both my current fics should have updates sometime tomorrow, so keep a keen eye out my little hentai fans! OH! And for those of you wondering, Three, Six and Two should be posted by the end of the month. Sorry it's taking so long, but I keep getting myself overheated as I write the extended lemon... fans self just thinking about it

omizumaru


	2. Persuasion

A fox darted from the underbrush to the middle of the road and paused, one delicate paw raised as it listened to the night

The scent of salt stung the taiyoukai's nose and he looked down into the face of his little ward. Still clutching his pant leg, Rin stared, wide-eyed, at the dead miko. Sesshomaru watched as a fat tear leaked from one large brown eye and trailed down the girl's round cheek. Never before had he seen her cry. She had been abducted, witnessed death in many forms, watched as humans and demons alike met their maker at his very claws, and not once had she shown such sadness. But he could recall how this woman had helped to rescue her from Naraku's clutches. She had treated Rin with a respect that few others gave to a human child, especially one who chose to keep company with one such as himself. Perhaps this explained the obvious sentimentality that the child had for the miko.

Dragging his golden gaze away from Rin, he resumed his visual perusal of the woman. Although he remembered the exceptional way in which she had treated his ward, he also recalled how it had been she that had been the cause of his one and only true loss in battle. She had been the one to draw forth the Tetsuisaga when both he and the half-breed had failed in their attempts to do so. It had also been this very miko that had been the source of the fang's transformation, and therefore the loss of his arm in the battle that ensued. He felt his left hand twitch with the memory and his eyes narrowed. He would never let anyone know what a trial it had been to get that damned arm restored.

He felt a pull at his hip and stopped glaring at the dead wench to look down at Rin. He had thought that it had been she who had tugged at him so swiftly, but his assumption was refuted when he saw that she was now kneeling a few paces in front of him and petting the miko's long hair with one small outstretched hand. He momentarily forgot about the unusual pulse in favor of a burst of anger towards the child and the miko. He found that he was slightly wounded by the fact that his ward was showing such tenderness to the woman that had injured his person so severely. But he remembered that the girl had never questioned him as to how he had received the wound, and he had, of course, never shared.

Startling him out of his thoughts was another pulse, this one stronger and unquestionably from the sword that rested against his side. Sesshomaru closed his eyes and set his jaw, attempting to quell the Tensaiga. There was no way in heaven, hell, or earth that he was going to resurrect Inuyasha's troublesome wench. After all, she was human and had obviously died an incredibly honorable death. What more could a creature so weak ask for? However, the sword would not be silenced, and gave another, more forceful, pull.

His eyes focused on the child again when he heard a tiny sniffle from her direction. It was not healthy for her to be here any longer; indeed he had wanted to keep her from the scene entirely. Growling low in the back of his throat, he issued forth a call that Ah-Un should join them.

"Come Rin" he told her gently. "It is unwise for one such as yourself to linger here."

The child did not even spare him a glance as she said in a broken voice "It is not right Sesshomaru-sama. Kagome is too young to die."

"All creatures inevitably suffer the same fate as she, Rin." After all, he was fairly certain that even he, eventually, would succumb to death.

"But Rin died, and Sesshomaru-sama saved Rin." Here she turned her tearstained face up to look hopefully into his eyes.

Were the fates so obviously against him that the child would now attempt to turn him against his better judgment? As if to inform him that, yes, the fates had exactly that in store, his sword pulsed again. "Hn" he said noncommittally while he looked away from the sad little girl with the wide and hopeful eyes.

Ah-Un stomped into the clearing and gave a loud snort. Obviously he did not appreciate the smell of so much blood and Sesshomaru admitted that it was slightly overpowering. He walked over to the beast and could feel Rin follow him. Turning, he picked the girl up and settled her down on Ah-Un's back. He did his best to avoid looking at her. "Ah-Un will take you back to camp Rin" he told her.

"Yes Lord Sesshomaru" she responded glumly.

Sesshomaru started to walk away from them when he felt a small hand latch onto his sleeve. Forgetting his resolve to not look into the eyes of the child lest the fates condemn him, large golden eyes met wet brown ones.

"Yes Rin?" Sesshomaru asked when it became apparent that the girl was not going to say anything unless prompted.

"Kagome was kind to Rin." And with that said, she released her hold upon him.

Sesshomaru could only stare as the girl turned her back on him and Ah-Un began to trudge into the forest.

I know it's short, but it seemed like an appropriate place to end the chapter. Without a shadow of a doubt, the next one will be longer.

Besides, I like the picture of Sesshomaru being shocked to silence. Seems like a nice way to close out the scene. giggles


End file.
